I tried parking my car—an SUV, which John had insisted on buying for our upcoming family—in front of the apartment, but SUVs were not made for the city. I eventually parked it tightly between a Cabriolet and a Fiat on 10th Street, except I didn’t know how I’d get it out again without ramming the Cabriolet’s black rubber bumper and the Fiat’s fender several times. But that was an obstacle I needn’t worry about for at least another hour, I thought, as I stared up at the building. A blue stone hung inside the large bay window, placed there by my aunt to ward off the Evil Eye. Auntie Siham was a fanatic for blue stones, everyone knew, and they appeared in every room of her house, making me feel like I was being followed. Nadia never seemed to care, but I guess she just got used to it. When Uncle Nader died, the stones went up more fiercely than ever before. Above the stove, in the bedroom closet, dangling from the shower head, from the rearview mirror of their car. Mama had never agreed with me that Auntie Siham’s obsession was weird. “Hanan, you don’t understand loss,” she said once in Arabic, standing in the living room, folding the pile of clean, fragrant laundry on the sofa. “Siham has lost more than you ever will in your whole life.”

Nadia answered the door right away. She hugged me tightly. “That was pretty fast,” I said, standing back on the front step to look at her.

She pointed upwards, and my eyes followed until I glimpsed the open second-floor window and the tiny white corner of a pillow peeking out over the sill. Of course. We sat up there a few minutes later, sipping Diet Cokes, our elbows entrenched in the pillows, looking down at 10th Street below us.

“I remember doing this when we were kids.”

“We’ve come far, huh?” she said, laughing. Nadia’s face was long and smooth, her long, aquiline nose delicate and aristocratic, sloping down to her full lips. When she smiled, her mouth almost met the corners of her eyes and her teeth became a half moon, sparkling and bright. She never wore makeup, though Aliyah, Reema, and I often tried to get her to put some lilac shadow on her lids, some brick red gloss on her lips, some mauve blush on her cheeks. But she resisted, saying she had no time to worry about makeup. She had the same philosophy about her hair—a silken, glossy black mass that she, unfortunately, kept tied up in a bun.

“Where’s your mother?”

“Visiting yours.”

I turned to her sharply, but she avoided my look, and continued gazing down at the boys playing Wiffle ball on the sidewalk below.

“I haven’t seen my mom since a week before the wedding—it’s been almost five months.”

“Avoiding her?” she asked gently.